Questioning everything

Egalitarianism vs Feminism

Egalitarianism is what appears to be the perfect philosophy to those who hate feminism or just don’t agree with it. The rules are very, very simple: treat everybody equally. Due the definition of egalitarianism, many people have compared it to feminism, a bold move that infuriates many egalitarians and feminists because of the many internal differences. In a nutshell, it’s like comparing the Church of Satan to The Satanic Temple. To understand the differences we must examine the movements.

Definition of egalitarianism
1: a belief in human equality especially with respect to social, political, and economic affairs
2: a social philosophy advocating the removal of inequalities among people

To start off, Egalitarianism is in fact a philosophy, not a political movement. Egalitarians believe that there should be equality for all people and that all humans are equal in basic worth or social status. Egalitarianism also advocates that the removal of economic inequalities, economic egalitarianism and decentralization of power. Egalitarian philosophies include socialism, communism, social anarchism, libertarian socialism, left-libertarianism, one-nation conservatism and progressivism

Definition of feminism
1: the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities
2: organized activity in support of women’s rights and interests

Although practically everybody knows about Feminism, a key difference between Egalitarianism and Feminism is a range of political movements, ideologies, and social movements. Feminism is a political movement that aims for equality for all women and rarely discusses equality of men, unlike egalitarianism. Feminism has also widely been criticised for the encouragement of misandry, feminism is also disliked by egalitarians.

A common argument against egalitarianism is equal opportunity vs equal outcome, although egalitarians believe in equality, they believe in equal oppurtunity to be a leader, or mayor and such, on the other hand feminists believe that humans should recognise their privilege and that sometimes a person (usually a person of colour) needs to be ‘helped’ to achieve their dream career. This does in fact enrage many egalitarians and normal people.

Due to the rise of feminism, many people have labeled themselves as egalitarians rather than feminists due to negativity related to the word. Many egalitarians want to fight for the ordinary citizen’s rights but do not want to be labelled a feminist, MRA or sometimes even MGTOW. Many feminists think that calling one an egalitarian is a way to stop conversations about race, gender or inequality without recognising that it is a philosophy, not a political movement.

In a world with so much racism, misandry, misogyny and inequalty, apparently a label is everything.